Touring Uzbekistan as a tourist

[limey]

So it's a bit different visiting these parts with Mr Limey in tow ... and a bit the same.
We checked in our luggage whereas I used to travel hand-baggage only (here in winter for tourism required more clothing) and I am still mildly amazed that it arrived when we did given that we were late landing in Istanbul so had to sprint to the Tashkent gate where boarding had allegedly started.
I am speaking English much more to keep Mr Limey in the loop so am aware of being considerably more conspicuous as a Westerner.
But the first day routine of catching up on a little sleep, changing money (UZS 8,000 or so to USD 1), and buying local sim card each for the phone (USD 12 for network registration, 5GB of data and 2 hours of local calls) was my standard practice.
We also bought some groceries to stock up the fridge in our hotel room and other necessities: USD 5.50 for bread, fruit juice, sausage, loo roll and razors. The shop gave me the picked gherkin i requested from the vat of clearly home-preserved produce as a free gift! Another USD 5.50 for 2.5 litres of beer and a bottle of very pleasant Georgian-style wine.
Dinner in the hotel was USD 20 for 2 courses each and a couple of beers including tip. The bar here where we ate is a separate business leasing space in the hotel premises so there's no putting stuff on the bill. This business model is common in FSU territories I believe.
There was a big, noisy pre-New Year party in the hotel restaurant this evening.
It also seems that the group tour I biked us on consists of a group of just us 2!

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